


The Games We Play to Keep Ourselves Sane

by FireflySong



Series: Pride Month Writing Prompt Challenge 2020 [2]
Category: Tales of Phantasia
Genre: A little bit of fluff at the end, F/M, i dont know man, its super short and sweet and i really don't even know what to tag, just really detailing the shit chester went through after toltus was attacked, minor angst in the middle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-03
Updated: 2020-06-03
Packaged: 2021-03-04 06:28:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24519211
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FireflySong/pseuds/FireflySong
Summary: Chester and Arche have a little game that they like to play.Written for Day 2: Game of the Pride Month Writing Prompt Challenge over on tumblr.
Relationships: Chester Burklight/Arche Klein
Series: Pride Month Writing Prompt Challenge 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1770988
Comments: 2
Kudos: 5





	The Games We Play to Keep Ourselves Sane

**Author's Note:**

> i honestly don't know what I'm doing here. this fandom is dead dead dead. but fuck if it isn't my fav tales game, and I am archester trash of the highest degree. so just take this shitty little thing and enjoy.
> 
> you can find me on tumblr at love-fireflysong if you feel so inclined!

It had started out simple enough. At first it had been a way to get back at the pink wench for calling him weak. An eye for an eye as you will. It had very quickly changed though. Soon the barbs and cutting words took a more good-natured edge, teases about cooking skills (or lack thereof), jokes of how both could be boiled down to a single color (blue and pink respectively), little pokes at how he was entirely too dour for his years while she was entirely too childish.

Of course, though unmentioned and unclarified by either of them, rules were in place for things that were to never, _ever_ be brought up. It was very clearly implied that any ribbing about Arche’s half-elven status was to be shut down immediately, and jokes about Chester’s sister Ami was in very, very poor taste. The last one lessened a bit when Suzu joined the team, but the visit to the elven village in Ymir Forest only cemented how important the first one was.

And it was fun. It was nice. It was, it was...

(Splinters from the wooden handle of the shovel were digging into his palms, his muscles aching and straining as he moved piles after piles of dirt, dug grave after grave. The burnt smell of hair and flesh mixed with the metallic scent of blood and smoke, practically suffocating him as it filled his nose and lungs with every laboured breath. The knuckles on his hand bloody and the skin broken from where he had hit Cress. His throat red and raw from screaming over Ami’s still warm dead body. If only he had been quicker. _Why hadn’t he been quicker?_ )

It was a nice distraction.

Chester wasn’t sure when the rules changed again though. Or rather, that a new game had been added. Not that he and Arche stopped playing the first one, it simply became a continuation. Only it was one played when the other’s weren’t looking their way, or was subtle enough that they wouldn’t notice any moves being made in front of them.

Moves like arguing about her flying skills when she crashes her broom through the treetops. Helping to pick the leaves and twigs from her hair and finishing by tracing the rounded shell of her ear and smirking at her red face clashing with her bubblegum hair as he walks away.

Moves like her teasing him about his aim while she helps bandage a wound on his arm he got when a Timber Wolf managed to get too close in their last battle, and kissing the injury after noticing that everyone else is distracted with their own after battle injuries. Leaving him flustered as she goes off to see if the others need any help.

If the original was a game for everyone to enjoy, then this game—intimate and oh so private—is just for them.

But as Chester stares towards Dhaos’ Castle, menacing and imposing against the perpetual darkness of the continent, he catches Arche out of the corner of his eye. And realizes that with their final confrontation looming ahead of them, that their games are about to come to an end very soon.


End file.
